


like a nightmare, neverending (let me change your world)

by jpnadia



Category: The Locked Tomb Trilogy | Gideon the Ninth Series - Tamsyn Muir
Genre: 4gfs, Alternate Universe - 1950s, Alternate Universe - Noir, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Blood, Blood Drinking, F/F, Human/Vampire Relationship, Vampire Harrowhark Nonagesimus
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-24
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-16 21:07:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28962894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jpnadia/pseuds/jpnadia
Summary: Hanging half her torso out the window, Harrow twists her neck in the air. Doesn't even care that she's tits-out to the world, not with that scent on the tumultuous breeze. It's always such shit when Harrow gets like this.Gideon Nav returns from the war and finds a job as a vampire’ssnackbodyguard. She thought she knew what she was getting into. She was wrong.
Relationships: Camilla Hect/Coronabeth Tridentarius, Camilla Hect/Gideon Nav/Harrowhark Nonagesimus/Coronabeth Tridentarius, Gideon Nav/Harrowhark Nonagesimus
Comments: 52
Kudos: 81





	1. 1: free your spirit after midnight

**Author's Note:**

> I have put in some noir characters, but not TOO many! You may want to get familiar with them now. Tag yourself!
> 
>   * An everyman struggling to fit into postwar America (GIDEON NAV) 
>   * A femme fatale with ~secrets~ (CORONABETH TRIDENTARIUS, with emphasis on the _femme_ , but also HARROWHARK NONAGESIMUS, with emphasis on the _fatale_ ) 
>   * A washed-up cop (CAMILLA HECT)
> 


Shingles skitter off the roof as the wind beats against the house. The wooden beams tremble under the onslaught and the building rocks under them. At least the bones are sturdy. Nothing else about the house they’re staying in is worth shit. It wouldn’t surprise Gideon if the roof caved in, spraying their prone forms with tack nails and slate. 

At least it’s not raining. Judging by the brown water stains dripping down from the ceiling, the roof leaks.

The only good thing about this entire trip is in the creaky bed with her. Harrow has her head on Gideon's chest, listening to her heart beat. Her palm lies cold and smooth against Gideon’s naked belly. The blanket scratches where it touches Gideon’s skin, making Harrow the boniest tent pole holding up their little cave of warmth. Gideon’s thigh throbs from the proximity, even though it was Corona’s turn to feed Harrow today. Gideon's still vibrating from the aftermath of that one.

In spite of the musty smell of mold covered up by the newer smell of fresh blood, it’s a good moment. Gideon savors it, the way she’s savored every good moment since she came back from the war. Every one is a rare and precious treat, and she deserves none of them.

It should be easy to go to sleep like this. God knows, Gideon has had enough practice sleeping in less hospitable conditions. In spite of that, she struggles against the rising tide of slumber. Harrow is safe, and calm, and _here_. It never lasts.

* * *

Gideon's only half drowsing when Harrow whips her head up. Gideon can't hear anything, but Harrow's senses are keener than hers. Gideon knows what it means, even before Harrow says: "She's coming."

Gideon dives out of bed, goes for her sword first and her trousers second. "We have to get out of here."

Harrow's groping for her clothes too, but before she puts them on, she opens the cracked window. It's a bare portal into the midnight graveyard outside. There were never any storm windows.

Hanging half her torso out the window, Harrow twists her neck in the air. Doesn't even care that she's tits-out to the world, not with that scent on the tumultuous breeze. It's always such shit when Harrow gets like this.

Well, if Gideon is going to have to haul Harrow away again, she wants help. "Cam! Cor!" she yells, pounding on the wall that separates their bedrooms. There's no secret code. They'll know what it is from the tone of her voice, from the godawful hour of the night. If they have to have an eldritch horror chasing them, Gideon wishes the horrors would come at teatime. She functions better with a full night of sleep.

Maybe that's the point.

Even with her human ears, she can hear Cam dressing, Cor groaning and stretching.

Harrow has finally gotten her clothes on: trousers, shirt, cloak, the silk gloves that Gideon hates and lusts after in equal measure. She turns the knob and starts down the creaky stairs, and Gideon swears and goes after her.

She catches up before Harrow can get out the gate, grabs her hard around the waist. "No, Harrow, don't do this," Gideon says, crouching so she can say the words directly into Harrow's ear. "Don't leave me."

Harrow isn't listening. The lure of the hunter is too strong. They've let Alecto get too close. The strength of that pull adds itself to Harrow's preternatural strength, and Gideon can’t hold her still. She needs Cam and Cor.

Gideon digs her heels as hard as she can into the dry ground, wraps both arms around Harrow’s, makes the most of her weight as she tries and fails to hold her back. Dust flies up behind her as Harrow drags her along. It clouds her lungs, thick like drought. She doesn't dare cough, because even that might make her lose her grip.

It's nearly too late when they finally blow through the door. It slams behind them but doesn’t latch. The rotting wood flaps in the gale. 

It's after midnight, but Corona manages to shine like a beacon, reflecting all the light of the crescent moon like she's some kind of phosphorescent creature. Which is nonsense-- when it comes down to it, Corona is as human as Gideon or Cam. In her shadow, Gideon can pick out the faint grey movement that means _Camilla._ As always, Cor goes to Harrow's left side, and Cam goes to Harrow's right, and together, they can pull her to the car.

That, at least, is in good repair. It's a '47 Range Rover Silver Wraith, sleek and black and shiny and new. Coronabeth's car. The first time Corona had driven up in it, Gideon had barely dared to touch it. She doesn't have that luxury now as they wrestle Harrow into the back seat. At least Harrow's nails are short, and won't leave gouges in the upholstery. Coronabeth pouts when that happens. (It's still better than dying.)

Gideon tries to remember the last time they were close enough to a petrol station to refuel. They're out in the middle of nowhere on purpose, because vampires don't mix well with dense populations. Harrow was supposed to be safe with the three of them around her. She doesn't pose a danger to anyone. The hunter should leave her alone.

Alecto crests the ridge, and there's a drop in pressure on Harrow’s left side.

"Corona!" snaps Cam, shoving Harrow into the back seat by strength of adrenaline. "This is no time to be distracted!"

Gideon needs to drag Harrow into her seat, to do up the buckles so they can get out of there. She doesn't have time to spare to look at Cor's face. She does anyway, and sees that golden jaw gone slack with lust. "She's gorgeous," says Corona.

Cam finishes wrestling with Harrow's seatbelt. The lock clicks audibly into place. She makes a lunge for Corona. "For fuck's sake, not you, too! You're not even a vampire!"

Gideon tugs on Harrow's seatbelt to make sure it's really secure. It is. That's good, because it means that Harrow can't run out of the car and try to greet her promised death with a kiss. It's also bad, because if that same promised death catches up with them, Harrow will be a sitting duck.

There's no time for more. Corona has taken three faltering steps toward Alecto, and Gideon runs around the car.

"Pull it together, Tridentarius," she says, gripping onto the flesh of Corona's arms. "Or else I'll have to drive your car. And you know I don't drive too careful."

This has no effect whatsoever, and Gideon has to hold her back with main force as she tries to take another step.

Cam slaps Corona full across the face. Gideon would never dare, but that _does_ work. She comes to as if she's been sleepwalking through a minefield, scared but glad to find out she still has all her pieces attached. "What--"

"Talk later. Drive now." Cam thrusts the car keys into Corona's palm, and Corona shuts up and swings into the driver's seat, her hand on the stick shift.

Gideon vaults over the hood and is still the last one in the car. "Drive!" she yells, even though Corona's already turning the engine over. The tires squeal against the hard dirt of the driveway, and they abandon the house.

Well, they wouldn't be the first.

* * *

By the time they get to the highway, Corona's knuckles are white on the steering wheel. "What was that?"

"We were hoping you could tell us," Cam says. She's in the backseat as always, knife in her lap just out of grabbing range of Harrow's pinioned arms. Gideon's always thought it's funny that this is the safer option, but when they'd wrecked Camilla's car six months before, it had taken agonizing minutes to get to the right tool to slice Harrow free. Never again.

"She was just so beautiful." Corona merges smoothly past a Chevrolet. "I had to go to her."

"That's how it is," says Harrow. They've been over this ground a thousand times. Only Cam still thinks they'll find a way to neutralize the hunter allure. Even for her, it's stubbornness and not real hope.

To forestall the argument, Gideon digs out the sleek leather case of road maps that Corona keeps under the front bench seat. "Where are we going?"

"Palamedes," says Harrow immediately. She’s calm in the back seat now that they’ve put miles between the vampire and the hunter.

"No," says Cam, but it’s knee-jerk. "We can’t put him in danger."

"Corona is human. Alecto shouldn’t be able to draw her. We need Palamedes’s expertise," insists Harrow.

Corona wrinkles her nose. "Can we just call him? It’s long-distance, but the money doesn’t matter if it’s important." Easy for Corona to say-- Corona is rich. Still, it’s a good thought. 

But Harrow wouldn’t endanger one of their few allies on a whim. If they need help, he’s a much better choice than Ianthe.

"He’ll need my records and Cam’s notebooks," says Harrow. "We can’t do this over a pay phone, and I don’t want to stay anywhere long enough to be able to give him a phone number. We need to go in person."

That bad news falls into dense silence. They’ve been intermittently on the run for months now, but they can usually find an abandoned house or run-down motel where they can stay for a few weeks. Gideon rustles the correct map open. Spreads it over her lap. "We don’t have to stay for long. He and Harrow can do what they need to do, and then we can move on."

"If Alecto catches up?"

"The usual plan. Palamedes can get himself out of the line of fire. He’s a scientist, not a vampire. She’s not interested in him." Harrow says this with an indefinable aura of smug wrapped around her. Gideon catches a glimpse of her fangs in the rearview mirror. That, that right there? That’s the whole damn problem.

Harrow can’t stop flirting with the idea that she can _fix_ Alecto. That someday, if Harrow studies for long and hard enough, Alecto will want Harrow as much as Harrow wants Alecto. The hunter will slide her cold undead fingers up Harrow’s cold undead thighs.

It’s a nonsense dream. The only thing Alecto is ever going to slide anywhere near Harrow is her sword across Harrow’s throat, so deep it severs the spinal column. The only reason Harrow even wants her is because of some bullshit mystical hold the hunters have over vampires.

Gideon doesn’t want to talk about this anymore. She nudges Corona’s shoulder and points to the fuel gauge. "We need gas."

They’ve been driving long enough that the first feeble rays of dawn are breaking over the distant horizon. Corona pulls off the highway and begins the hunt for a filling station that will be open at fuck o’clock in the morning.

* * *

By the time they find one, the engine is sputtering on fumes. In the backseat, Cam sheathes her knife and unlocks Harrow’s buckles. Corona charms the groggy station attendant so he doesn’t notice a damn thing.

"Need help?" Gideon asks Cam, who's helping Harrow out of the car so that she can stretch her stiff limbs.

"Nah." Cam jerks her head down the street. She knows how antsy Gideon gets when they have to talk about Alecto. "Be back in half an hour or we’ll get breakfast without you."

Gideon ambles off, scoping out Main Street for a likely diner. Good thing it's so damn early: they'll stick out like a hand with four sore thumbs when this sleepy town wakes up. Another reason to make sure she gets back to her girls quickly, beyond the simple fact that Cam will make good on her threat. (Gideon has had more than one morning where she’s had to eat dry iron-fortified cereal in the car because she got back late.)

Still, it’s good to breathe some air that doesn’t taste like diesel. They’re going to be on the road for the next few days, so she’s going to move her body when she can. Her back is already sore from sitting, which doesn’t bode well. She should expect it at this point.

The thing is, Gideon has _seen_ Alecto. She's had _dreams_ about muscled curves encased in black leather. There's an appeal there, if you don't care if you survive the encounter. But she's also learned a lot in the past three years: about how every time a vampire is born, so too is born a hunter. Most hunters don't survive to maturity. Vampires seek them out. They can't help themselves. It's something in the biological reaction that makes vampirism _possible_ . Harrow has explained the mechanism, but Gideon has never understood it. All she needs to know is: the ones that survive those early years become _dangerous_. And Alecto is as old as they come.

The thing that she doesn't need to know, but can't stop telling herself, is that she needs to ignore Harrow when Harrow says she loves Alecto. It may be true. Gideon can't rule it out. And she has no illusions that Harrow harbors romantic sentiment for _her_. But Gideon has fought Alecto off to let Corona and Camilla escape with their vampire, and Gideon knows this with dead certainty: Alecto is not human, and Alecto will never feel love.

Fighting Alecto should bring Gideon-- _something_. Relief or catharsis or some other psychological buzzword. Gideon doesn't know, but whatever it is that usually happens when she has her sword in her hand and feels for once like she's _whole_ and _complete_ and _useful_ doesn't happen when she fights Alecto. Instead, it's a terrible, gruesome grind against a wholly inhuman opponent. She can't even fight to a stalemate: it's a foregone, inevitable conclusion that Alecto will win, inch by bloody inch.

And Gideon can’t stop fighting.


	2. 2: don't be scared, don't drown in tears

_Before_

The address is the penthouse of the tallest building in town. Gideon gets up twelve flights of stairs before she runs into a blank wall. Some superstitious architect got a little too into blocking off the thirteenth floor. But she has the directions in the advert, and she really needs the job. After the war, jobs are scarce, and jobs for women like her even scarcer.

So, she levers herself out the window, ascends the last rickety flight of stairs on the damn fire escape. Knocks on the window.

A door she didn't see before she knocked swings open. The aperture opens up into a darkened hallway, not a soul in sight.

There, sitting up ramrod straight on a chaise longue, sits a tiny woman with a mass of pitch-black curls jammed under a hat. She’s wearing a modern jacket over a dress that's fifty years out of date, and there’s an enormous tome in her lap.

Gideon has never been great at etiquette, but she knows this one. She takes off her hat and clears her throat. "I’m here about the job?"

The woman sets her book aside and rises to meet her. Her arms are like _toothpicks_. No wonder she needs a bodyguard. She’d probably blow over in a stiff wind.

"My name is Harrowhark Nonagesimus." She holds out her hand, and their eyes catch. Harrowhark Nonagesimus has the darkest eyes Gideon’s ever seen, so pitch black that Gideon can barely make out the pupil in the dim light. It's a damn shame that Gideon's in the market for a job, not a girlfriend, because this woman is exactly Gideon's type: tiny and self-possessed, with a delicately-formed mouth ripe for kissing. Then again, most women are Gideon's type. Gideon's not picky.

Packing away her hormones, Gideon takes the proffered hand. There’s wiry strength in the knobbly knuckles. Not a woman to underestimate, then. Well, neither is she. "Gideon Nav. You need a bodyguard, Mrs. Nonagesimus?"

"For formal occasions, it’s _Reverend Daughter_." The woman grimaces. "For everyday use, _Harrowhark_ will do. And, yes, I do need someone to protect me, but more importantly, I need you to keep me from killing anyone else."

That patently does not compute. Technically, this tiny woman could be a sharpshooter with ten guns hidden under her skirts, but Gideon doubts it. More to the point, you don't _accidentally_ kill people by shooting them with a concealed weapon. Gideon knows from experience. And there's no way Harrowhark's going to lose her temper and take someone out with her bare hands. If Harrow is worried she's going to kill people, it would be a lot easier and a lot cheaper to stop carrying guns. 

Maybe she just wants someone big to stand by her and look decorative. Gideon doesn't mind being someone's show pony, as long as she gets paid. The money is too good for it to be that easy, though. The whole situation reeks, worse than the trash outside the mess hall on Saturday morning. There’s got to be a catch.

While she's puzzling this out, Harrow taps her foot theatrically on the floor. "It's very simple. If you can't manage it, there's the door." Patience is evidently not one of this woman’s virtues. 

(The door she indicates is different from the one Gideon used to enter the room. Gideon can't remember seeing this one before, either.)

"Doll, I can handle it," says Gideon absently, trying to figure out how she’d missed a potential exit when she initially scoped out the room. It's not a lie. She's very good with a gun and even better with the knife she keeps strapped to her belly, the one she still can't bring herself to take off when she's not behind a safely locked door.

"Oh really?" Harrow narrows her eyes. "Prove it."

And then Gideon's back is flat against the wall, and Harrow's arm is crushing her trachea, and Gideon is fighting for her life, and for the first time since the war she feels alive, really alive. She forgets about finding the catch and focuses on finding her next breath of air.

When she manages to throw Harrow off her, Gideon gulps in air the same way she gulps water after a hard workout. Her vision is a little fuzzy around the edges, and her throat feels tender, like it's going to bruise. Whatever. She's had worse and not even gotten paid. "What the fuck, lady?"

"You're good," says Harrow, looking speculative. "Fast. That's useful."

Then there's a blur of motion and a sound of ripping fabric, and Gideon stares blankly at the ground, because there's Harrowhark Nonagesimus on the floor at her feet.

She's had a lot of fantasies about women going on their knees for her. None of them are anything like this, none of them involve snarling or anyone ripping down the front of Gideon's best trousers, and she's not awful with a needle but there's no way she'll be able to mend these--

And then there's pain on the inside of her right thigh-- what the fuck, this woman bites?-- followed by an incredible lightheadedness and then a completely inappropriate rush of arousal.

Or-- maybe not inappropriate, because Harrow's _lapping at Gideon's thigh_ , and, okay, that's objectively pretty hot. Gideon has no idea what's going on here, but it could be so much worse. She could be back overseas. 

She survived there, and she can survive this, too. 

Her knees wobble, and she locks them out. Harrowhark has skinny, talonlike fingers, and for all that she keeps her nails short, she can still dig in with the bones. Gideon's going to have little fingerprint bruises all over her hips. It's with some astonishment that Gideon realizes she's about to come, all from whatever weird thing having this woman suck on her thigh is doing to her. "Lady--" she begins. 

Harrow doesn't unlatch from Gideon's thigh. She looks up over the plane of Gideon's belly, rolls her eyes. Unhooks a hand from Gideon's hip and makes a "carry on" gesture, as if she couldn't be more bored when Gideon's making a mess of her shorts. 

It shames Gideon that the only thing she can think about is how much she wants the hand back, the pressure of Harrow's fingertips digging into flesh tethering her to the world. But she's got permission, or its weird equivalent. Even if she didn’t, she couldn’t help herself, anyway. She comes violently, banging her elbows back against the wall as her muscles jump and contract. 

It takes her too long to get her breath back. "What. The fuck. Was that." Harrow rocks back on her heels with blood on her lips-- Gideon's blood-- and licks them clean. 

"Didn't you enjoy yourself?"

There are weird chemicals fizzing in Gideon's bloodstream. Whatever weird contest this is, she suspects she's losing badly. "Doll, I don't know what _enjoy_ has to do with anything. I thought this was a job interview."

"It is. This is part of it."

"So, what. This is the test of whether I can stand up to someone biting my thigh? Because let me tell you, that doesn't seem too life-threatening to me."

"It’s obvious that you can handle physical violence." Harrowhark gestures dismissively at Gideon’s biceps, which deserve better. "This is another part of the job description."

"Run that by me again."

"I'm a vampire. Things run much more smoothly when I have a source of regular meals. Don't worry, you'll be well-compensated."

"Wait, seriously?"

"You're welcome to check my teeth."

It doesn't matter if Harrow is a vampire or not. It matters if Harrow can pay.

But this interview has already passed the point of absurdity. They’re squarely in _fever dream_ territory, so Gideon takes Harrow up on her offer, sliding a finger into her mouth to run the pad over her top teeth. Her canines are just as pointed against her hand as they were against her thigh, and Gideon can't detect any lines that would indicate weird dental work. Her tongue is _cold_ against Gideon's finger. It usually takes more than this to rouse her again, but this is intriguing. Compelling. She needs to take her hand out of Harrow’s mouth before she makes a fool of herself.

Still, she's feeling daring, giddy with sex and the sheer improbability of the situation. "If part of working for you involves you ripping up my trousers, it had better include a hefty clothing allowance."

"I won't rip up your trousers if you take them off for me."

In that moment, Gideon can't think of anything she wants to do more than take her trousers off for Harrowhark Nonagesimus. Her knees wobble, and she scrabbles at her belt, sliding the ruined garment down her thighs until it pools on the floor. She steps out of them and nearly loses her balance.

Humiliatingly, Harrow takes hold of her waist and guides her down to a seat on the chaise. "It's normal to be a little dizzy after blood loss."

Gideon knows that. She's lost blood before in much larger quantities than this. "How much do you need, anyway?"

"Not much. An ounce will keep me going for twenty-four hours." She smiles conspiratorially. "Have I scared you off yet?"

"No," says Gideon, which is only half true. She's scared, but she's also desperately intrigued and more than a little bit turned on. "I want the job," she adds, and that at least is the whole truth.

"If I am going to hire you, we need to be clear on one thing," says Harrow. She pauses, considering. "Well, several things, but this one also." 

"Anything," says Gideon, hazily aware that the ongoing flush of post-orgasmic hormones are not improving her negotiating position. She can't quite bring herself to care. Her limbs feel like they're swimming in the thick juice that she gets when she opens a can of peaches.

"Never call me 'doll' again."

That's a concession Gideon can make. She nods her head in agreement, and a wave of dizziness overtakes her. The world lurches sideways, blackness overtakes her vision, and Gideon falls back onto the chaise longue.

* * *

Gideon opens her eyes in a panic, coming to consciousness in a place she doesn't recognize.

Her shorts are damp and cold against her thighs. A pair of fathomless black eyes swim into her vision, and she yelps.

"Relax," says Harrow. "You were only out for about ten minutes."

Gideon fights her way up onto her elbows and drives her fingers through her hair, checking for blood, but her hands come away clean.

"You don't have a head injury," says Harrow, and then pauses. "Or, at least, you didn't incur one in my presence. Side effects of feeding a vampire, I'm afraid. The sensitive can experience some dizziness the first few times. Next time we'll use a bed."

There's a _lot_ going on in those sentences. Gideon has about twenty-five questions she wants to ask. She's sucking in air like she's just run a marathon. Her thoughts are like scrambled eggs. Instead of asking anything sensible, what ends up coming out is: "That was _incredibly messed-up_."

Harrow scowls. "If you changed your mind about wanting the job, the door's over there."

The last thing Gideon wants to do is lose a shot at this job. She's half-naked and her best interview trousers-- her _only_ interview trousers-- are shot. "Nah, I'm in."

"Good." Harrow fetches a sheaf of papers from a tall bookshelf. Gideon tries to get up to follow her. "No, don’t get up. You’re still woozy. I can tell.’

So Gideon lies there on the chaise while this primly-attired woman perches next to her. There’s a careful half an inch between her hips and Harrow’s. She can feel the temperature-- on a normal woman, it would be all heat, but Harrow’s cold, like she’s sucking all the warmth out of Gideon’s body and into her.

Harrow’s going over the paperwork, but Gideon doesn’t care. It’s all fine-print stuff. She’ll figure it out when it comes up-- even if she read it through she’d never remember it. Right now, the more important thing is the soft curve of Harrowhark’s breasts, conveniently located in Gideon’s eyeline. Her mouth waters with the imagined taste of a cold nub of nipple against her tongue. 

She’s running her thumb over the place Harrow bit her. There’s not even a scab. The skin is raised, but whole, and absurdly sensitive. When she gets home, she wants to see what it looks like in a mirror. 

It takes her too long to realize Harrow is trying to get her attention.

"Gideon. Gideon. _Griddle_."

She stirs herself to attention. "No, you had it right. It’s Gideon."

Harrow ignores this. "You weren’t paying attention. This is important, Griddle."

Gideon winces. Apparently, she’s earned herself a diminutive. "Right, I’m sorry. Keep going."

"Stop doing that. It’s distracting." Harrow catches her wrist and pulls her hand away from her thigh. "And if you keep doing it, I might bite you again."

That’s the best damn idea Gideon’s heard in months. Her voice comes out husky. "Really?"

Harrow blinks, nonplussed. "What?"

"Fuck the paperwork." Gideon pries the packet out of Harrow’s slackened hands and sets it on the floor. "Hire me. Bite me again."

"You do realize--"

"I don't _care_." Very deliberately, Gideon slides her legs apart and trails her fingertips over the bite mark.

Harrow _snarls_. Holy shit. There’s no way anything should be this hot, but Gideon is wet and ready to go in an instant, _again_ , even before Harrow _blurs_ in front of her. There’s pain in her thigh, and it’s even better this time. Her hamstrings jump under Harrow’s cold palms.

Shamelessly, Gideon shoves her hand down her shorts. It takes two seconds before she comes, but there’s more where that came from. She’s never been so primed to go off again, and again, and again, like her clit is the trigger of a Johnny gun. 200 to 600 rounds a minute. No wonder her head’s buzzing. Maybe she should have worn hearing protection.

When Harrow rears up over her, Gideon whines. That was the best thing she’s ever felt in her life. She wants more of it. There’s blood on Harrow’s mouth-- Harrow’s licking it off-- Gideon could kiss her if she’d just come _here_ \--

"That must never happen again," says Harrow, climbing off the chaise and brushing her hands down her gown.

"The hell it won't, Nonagesimus, that was the hottest thing I've ever even heard of. And I've read a _lot_ of magazines." Wobbly from blood loss, Gideon manages to haul herself upright. Semi-upright. She’s on a chaise; there’s only so much she can do. Her legs aren’t working right.

"No matter how 'hot' you think it was, Nav, you can't afford the risk." Harrow draws a finger up the front of Gideon's thigh, lets the tip of her nail rest on Gideon's hip bone. "I could have killed you."

"I still don't care."

"But I do." Harrow's midnight eyes bore into her like the bit of a drill in an abandoned gold mine. "I require my bodyguards to stay alive."

Gideon wonders, frantically, how much she needs this job. (It's a lot. She won't be able to make rent next month without it. Besides, the job has its teeth in her. Uh, figuratively, too. She can get paid, figure out what the _hell_ is going on here, and maybe get some more rapid-fire orgasms in the deal. There’s no way she’s backing out now, and Harrow knows it.)

"However," Harrow continues, after a long pause. "There may be a way to make this work. If you follow the _rules_ , Nav."

Sign Gideon the fuck up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I put my notes together, I realized that I had enough content for two Gideon/Harrow first times! So I wrote them both. :D


	3. 3: in the darkness, in the shadow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains four girlfriends, three-ish vampire sex scenes, a reunion with two old friends, and one reference to the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1944.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> They don't wear seatbelts in this, because those weren't yet common safety features in the late 1940s/early 50s. But they are now, and you should wear yours. Also don't smoke and take your vitamins, or something. Hopefully this discharges my Responsible Fic Author duty for the next little while so I can continue playing in the lovely sandbox of This Is Fiction, Don't Try This At Home.

_now_

It's still the butt end of the morning when Gideon gets back. She checks her watch. Could have taken longer; it's only been fifteen minutes. But she doesn't want to push it. Besides, there's something making her antsy. Not the town, which is normal enough, but in the air. She's learned to trust her instincts, and sniffs, but there's nothing unusual, just the faint scent of iron from the meat-packing plant across town and the fresh scent of pancakes coming from the diner down the street. Which reminds her.

"Found somewhere for breakfast," she tells Cam.

"Good," says Cam. "I want to get back on the road."

The three of them troop down the street while Corona finds somewhere to park the car. Harrow keeps looking down, and Gideon knows it's not modesty but the scar on her inner thigh that's drawing Harrow's attention.

"After breakfast," she says soothingly.

Harrow growls at her, like she's halfway to ravenous already. Reminds Gideon of the early days it was just the two of them, when Harrow still had to go out and hunt, when Harrow had never been really satiated. But that shouldn't apply now. Harrow had eaten the previous evening. She shouldn't need to eat again so soon, not unless something's burning off the blood magic. Probably Alecto again. Gideon hates her so much.

"We can't here," Gideon says in her most soothing tones, "but when we get back to the car--"

"Nav, _no_ ," Cam snaps. "It's not your turn. And we need to make miles." 

"Right," says Gideon. She points to the door as Corona rushes up behind them in a flurry of hair and perfume. "The point is: breakfast."

The diner is mostly empty, thank God, and they shuffle awkwardly into a booth in the back corner, so Gideon can sit where she can see both the pane-glass door they entered and the swinging door that leads into the kitchen. They each order eggs and sausages and orange juice and enriched-wheat toast, even Harrow, who will surreptitiously portion out her food between her companions. It draws attention when folks notice Harrow doesn't eat, and too much attention gets them run out of town.

When the waitress is gone, Cam discreetly slides each of them the morning iron supplement. Gideon swallows hers dry and hopes that the food gets there before the nausea does.

Harrow, who's usually preternaturally still and quiet, keeps fidgeting on the vinyl bench next to Gideon. Her foot impacts the leg of the table. The sugar canister rattles a warning, and Cam glares. "You know the rule, Harrowhark."

The rule is: feed the humans first, because dehydrated humans faint too easily when they lose blood.

"Something's coming," says Harrow, but she doesn't continue, because food arrives. It came fast and it's edible, and maybe Gideon could ask for more but she isn't going to, not with Harrow gently spooning eggs from her plate to Gideon's after adding just the amount of salt Gideon likes.

It's habit to eat fast, and today Gideon takes huge mouthfuls that make her throat hurt when she swallows. It's like the pressure drop right before a storm rolls in and not like that at all, because the sun is coming in bright and cheerful from outside.

"I want to get there as fast as possible," Cam's saying when Gideon emerges. 

"If you want to take shifts, I can drive," Gideon says hopefully. It's eighteen more hours in the car, and Corona's already driven six.

"I can push through." Corona sips at her coffee.

Beside her, Harrow jerks. The orange juice left in her cup sloshes dangerously. Gideon rescues it and drains it. Problem solved.

"Harrow, will you stop that?" Cam demands. "You're drawing attention."

"I know," says Harrow. "We need to get on the road."

Only then does Gideon realize she's been tracing the raised skin of her scar through her trousers. "Sorry," she tells Harrow.

"It's not you. I'm hungry, and you're picking up on it." When Harrow is this agitated, they'd better get under way sooner. Gideon hustles them all out the door while Cam handles the bill.

* * *

They don't talk about it as they pile into the car. Gideon pulls out the maps and charts the route as Corona keeps to a sedate pace until she gets out of town. Then she puts her foot down. ("Is that a reasonable and prudent speed?" asks Cam, from the backseat. "After the night we had?" Corona says. "It's fine.")

The best route Gideon can find is still a mess of highways and back roads. (The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1944 was supposed to fix the system, but of course the government hadn't put real money behind it. Typical government project.)

Cam waits until Gideon gives the direction to stay on the next fragmented section of highway for twenty miles, and then she brings up the topic they've been avoiding. "You shouldn't be hungry. You ate last night." 

"I ate before we saw _her_."

"You've never needed extra food before." They've had maybe a handful of encounters with the Hunter, which is at least five too many for Gideon's taste.

"I've always been in a position to discreetly supplement my diet elsewhere," Harrow says, guiltily. "And last night was particularly intense."

"You should have told me." Cam keeps their records. Seeks out the patterns. It's what she did for Palamedes, and it's what she does now. Gideon suspects that her habitual careful record-keeping was what got her thrown off of the police force. Hard to cover up rampant bribery when there's a rookie going around carefully documenting the evidence.

"It's a weakness. I didn't like to mention it." Harrow's been keeping her secrets for longer than Cam has been around to understand them.

"Next time, tell me," says Cam.

Gideon checks in the rearview mirror. In spite of the lecture, Cam's unbuttoning her jacket. The look on Harrow's face makes Gideon's hand go to her inner thigh again. She doesn't catch herself until Harrow growls a warning. "Are you ready, Hect?"

"Keep the blood off my upholstery," Corona puts in, automatically.

Neither Cam nor Harrow are listening, though Cam does lay her jacket across the seat before allowing Harrow to pull her down across her lap. The inner lining is already bloodstained from a dozen misadventures. This will hardly make it worse, especially since Harrow is very tidy when she eats.

Gideon, very carefully, does not crane around in her seat when Harrow’s teeth slice into Cam’s throat. There’s no ignoring it: even Cam groans when Harrow pierces her skin. She’s the quietest of them, though that’s not saying a lot, given that the other choices are Corona, who makes a silver-screen production out of everything she does, and Gideon, who is "susceptible"-- which means Harrow reduces her to a quivering mess every time fang hits flesh.

In the rearview mirror, Harrow works her hand into Camilla’s slacks. (That thing about vampires and mirrors? A myth. And thank God, because this is a sight, even in distorted miniature.)

There’s a moment, every time Harrow feeds from Cam, where Cam finally surrenders and her head goes slack on Harrow’s shoulder. Usually, Gideon takes advantage of it to find that spot inside Corona’s cunt that makes her dig her own teeth into the meat of Gideon's shoulder with the force of her pleasure. She definitely can’t do that while Corona’s driving.

Corona seems to be having similar thoughts. She whips her head to look into the backseat. The car jerks halfway into the other lane on the empty road.

"Do you need me to drive?" asks Gideon with some urgency.

"I’m fine," says Corona, bringing her eyes back to the road and the car back to its side of the road. "It’s just a lot."

It is. Harrow is bringing the sum total of her centuries of experience to bear, and even Camilla can’t hold up under the onslaught. The little half-choked whimpers Harrow has coaxed from Cam are a rarity.

"We'll take care of you once we get there," Gideon promises wildly. She can't speak for Cam and Harrow, of course, but right now they're busy and can't reassure Corona themselves.

"You'd better," says Corona grimly, and drives on.

* * *

They turn down Palamedes's driveway well after midnight. He's planted perennials thickly over the grounds, which were a farm before the dust bowl drove the owners out. Now they're thick with scraggly bushes and trees. The moon casts jagged shadows through the foliage. The car bumps down the dirt path until the house comes into view and Corona pulls off to park on the patch of dirt that serves as Palamedes's front yard. Usually, there are chickens scratching in the dirt in front of the porch. Tonight, it's still as death.

The house is a run-down single-storey ranch that Palamedes shares with his research partner, Dulcie. It's sequestered off in the middle of nowhere to avoid questions and judgements. ("Aren't you two married?" and "where do you go to church?" are bad enough, but "what was that funny noise we heard at 3:00AM last night?" is even worse.)

Someone turns on the porch light. The door bangs open. Palamedes emerges, wearing well-patched buttoned-up grey pajamas that expose his skinny ankles. Gideon has never been so glad to see anyone in her life. He knows more about vampires and hunters than anyone who's still alive, and most of the undead to boot.

"You got here fast," he observes as Corona unfolds herself from the driver's seat. She shakes out the long folds of her A-line dress. (Gideon, who has never quite gotten over rationing, alternates between being appalled by and appreciative of Coronabeth’s many excesses.)

"We ate in the car," she says. "I don't like to, but I don't want the hunter to catch up with us."

"You let Gideon drive?" he pressed, as Harrow and Cam tumble out of the back seat, any grace marred with sleepiness.

"Never again," says Coronabeth, which is patently unfair. Gideon is a perfectly safe driver, and she hadn't so much as scratched the car the one time Corona let her behind the wheel. It's not her fault it took her two tries to turn it over.

Palamedes ignores this injustice. "It's been eighteen hours since Camilla called. That's not safe. You must be exhausted."

"It's fine." Corona waves her hand and goes to support Camilla, who, even after sleeping most of the day in the back seat, is visibly drooping.

Palamedes grabs her before she can walk through the door. " _How_?"

Corona meets him, eye to eye. They're the same height, except her hair makes her look taller. "Ianthe," she says, as if it's an answer.

Palamedes holds her gaze for one more beat, and then, astonishingly, lets the subject drop. "I set the camp bed up in Dulcie's room for you. She requested Camilla's company specifically. Try not to wake her-- she would have stayed up, but yesterday was a bad day."

Cam claws her way to alertness with visible effort. "Cor, do you need--?"

"It'll keep." They tangle themselves together there, right on the porch, and Corona grinds down slow and dirty onto Camilla's thigh as a reminder of the heat that charged every atom of air in the car for the whole long drive. She disengages, and adds: "I know you'll make it up to me when we're up again."

"Deal," says Camilla.

Gideon mourns the death of the promise she'd made-- any day she gets her hands in Coronabeth Tridentarius's pants is a good one-- but she can comfort herself with the knowledge that when Corona does want her, she'll make her desire known.

"So that means you two are in with me," Palamedes continues.

"We'll take the couch," says Harrow.

Gideon starts. "What?" There's nothing wrong with sharing with Palamedes-- his room is more comfortable than half the weird houses they've slept in. He doesn't even snore.

Harrow's icy fingers twine into Gideon's warm ones. "We're not going straight to sleep, and we've already kept you up too late."

Suddenly, Gideon is as awake as Coronabeth. Her hand snakes down to the seam of her trousers to press at her scar. Beside her, Harrow shudders. 

"Again?" asks Camilla, without taking her cheek off Corona's shoulder. Every other day, Harrow had said, back when she'd first hired Gideon. Never more than that. This cuts it close.

Gideon doesn't give a shit. "I'm awake." She got sleep in the car. Shitty sleep, but whatever. "I'll drink an extra glass of OJ or something. It's fine." She may pay for it tomorrow, but with any amount of luck tomorrow won't hold anything more strenuous than chopping firewood or helping to muck out the chickens.

Cam ignores this. "Harrow, really, you can't wait until Gideon has slept?"

Harrow growls at her. It sends sparks down Gideon's spine. 

"If you keep this up, we're going to need to add another donor to the rotation." But Camilla doesn't press the issue. Instead, she lets Corona lead her through the familiar farmhouse until they disappear quietly through Dulcie's bedroom door.

"I'm heading to bed, too," says Palamedes helpfully. "Please don't keep me up."

"We'll be good," Harrow says, slanting a glance up at Gideon. "Won't we, Griddle?"

Gideon suppresses a whimper. 

The bedroom door on the other side of the house closes behind Palamedes's retreating back. Harrow turns to Gideon. "You're going to have to be very quiet to respect our host," she says quietly. "Can you do that?"

Clenching her hands into fists, Gideon nods. This won't be easy, but she's managed more, and for less reason, in Harrow's service. She _likes_ Palamedes.

"Good girl," says Harrow. Her curt, slightly distracted tone can't mitigate the impact of those words. And then, to compound her cruelty: "Take off your pants."

Gideon is lost before her hands hit her belt buckle.

She doesn’t even get her trousers all the way off before Harrow shoves her onto the couch. Gideon doesn’t fight her. Her trousers are tangled around her ankles, but Harrow pushes her knees apart and brushes her nose over Gideon’s scar, which throbs under the contact.

"Please," whispers Gideon, as quietly as she can.

Harrow nods once, curt. Without further preamble, she bites.

When Cam’s around, she insists that Harrow uses her hands, even though Gideon gets off just fine under Harrow’s teeth alone. Half the time, Gideon thinks it’s unnecessary interference. Just now, though, with Harrow’s cold fingers slipping up Gideon’s shorts and parting her folds, Gideon's gratitude takes her by the throat and squeezes. Harrow’s thumb lodges firmly on the side of Gideon’s clit, and Gideon bites into her left bicep in a desperate bid to stay quiet.

In the end, the encounter is as short and frenzied as an ambush. There’s nothing left but to clean up the aftermath and care for the survivors. (Gideon’s trousers are not on the list of casualties. That’s good, because Gideon thinks all her extra clothes ended up in Dulcie’s room with Cam and Cor.)

She pulls the tangle of clothes off her legs: boots off, socks tucked inside; trousers off followed by her unpleasantly damp shorts, and then trousers back on over her naked ass with the belt pulled out of its loops and coiled next to the boots. The ruined shorts she wads up and shoves in her pocket. No one needs to see the evidence any more than they need to hear it.

Sleeping on a couch in her clothes without underwear isn’t her favorite, but it’s worth it to keep her friends happy. Gideon flops back onto the cushions. "I stayed quiet," she says, letting Harrow rearrange their limbs to her liking on the couch. 

"Good. Next time, I want to make you scream." Harrow elbows Gideon a few times on her way to a comfortable reclined position. She ends up halfway on top of Gideon, with her ear on Gideon’s chest.

Gideon curls an arm around Harrow’s waist. Her body is always so cold, and Gideon just wants to warm her. "Sounds good to me."

* * *

Gideon wakes up on Palamedes's couch with a crick in her neck and a leaden warmth weighing down her limbs. There are voices coming out from the kitchen, distinct even from the other room.

"Do you think she's tracking you?" asks Palamedes.

"Possible." Harrow's reply is crisp and precise.

"I can't help you if you don't give me the data, Harrowhark. Likelihood? Evidence?"

Gideon rolls onto her back. She can practically _taste_ Harrow's wince. there's no way she's getting up when she can lie here in a sunbeam and get all the briefing without stirring a muscle.

"There is perhaps a 25% chance that she's tracking someone else, and a 10% chance she's not tracking anyone but slaying vampires at random."

A ceramic coffee mug hits the table, causing a clatter of dishes. "Harrow, that's not just _possible_. That's _likely_."

"I don't wish to overstate the danger."

"But?"

"But I can feel it. Like a drain in my ventral cavity."

Camilla cuts in. "Warden, I have a theory that could substantiate this. If I can cross-reference your archives?"

"Go ahead. Harrow, I have an idea that might help, but I'll need some of your blood."

"Quickly, then," says Harrow. "Gideon will probably be up soon now."

That's her cue. "I'm up," says Gideon, standing up and throwing the quilt over the back of the sofa. "Why do you need her blood?"

"Excuse me," says Palamedes hastily. "Harrow, come find me."

"You didn't need to interfere," says Harrow. "I was fine."

"You were going to hide it from me."

"Well, yes, because you react like this."

Gideon yanks on her hair. It's not like she'll do it any harm; she hasn't had a proper cut in weeks and her bed head is monstrous. "Harrow, I'm supposed to be your bodyguard. How am I supposed to guard your body when you lie to me about it?"

"Palamedes isn't a threat."

"That's not the point." Realistically, Palamedes will have a plan for Harrow's blood that will benefit them all. Gideon doesn't understand why Harrow won't just _tell_ her what it is. "I need to know what's going on in your life."

"We live together," Harrow points out. "You know what's going on in my life. Drink your orange juice." She turns and sweeps off down the cellar stairs to Palamedes's basement laboratory.

The dismissal, more than anything, stings.

Gideon goes to the fridge, pours herself a glass of juice, drains it, and pours herself a second glass to drink more slowly. She's alone in the kitchen in the silent house, which is a feat with six people staying in it. But Coronabeth is sleeping, Harrow and Palamedes are in his basement doing creepy weird things, and Camilla is in the library. Dulcie is probably out with the chickens. She writes, when they're at a single address long enough to receive letters. The last one said that they're getting good results from mild exercise in the fresh air.

She helps herself to iron-fortified cereal from the cupboard and hard-boiled eggs from the icebox, eats alone standing at the counter, and goes to chop firewood. Palamedes has a wood-burning stove and little enough arm strength of his own. At least there she can be of some use.

* * *

When the sun begins to dip over the horizon, Camilla comes to get her, taking the axe away from her in gentle hands. There’s sweat and grime crusted on Gideon’s forehead, and a respectable piled of split logs stacked outside the back door.

She wipes her hands off on her trousers and joins everyone at the supper table. Corona is up at last, stretching and wiping sleep from her eyes, and Dulcie has put together a roast chicken that makes Gideon’s mouth water. There’s squash from the garden to go with it and a salad consisting of a pile of green leaves drenched in vinegar. Gideon piles her plate high and tries not to think about any of it.

Afterward, she takes her place at the sink to wash the dishes, and Corona joins her to dry and shelf. "You went hard today."

"I wanted to help out." Gideon tries not to sound bitter about it. Instead, she sounds like a damn Boy Scout.

"Will you help out tonight? Harrow is hungry again."

Immediately, Gideon reaches to her scar. It leaves a splodge of soapy water on her dusty trousers.

"Not like that, it’s my turn. But will you join us?"

"I promised," Gideon really needs to work on her poker face, because the way Corona smiles at her means she’s given everything away in spite her attempt at diffidence.

Corona puts the last plate in its place and shoves at Gideon’s shoulder. "Go shower, Nav, you smell like a farm animal."

Gideon feels like one, too, she decides as the anemic trickle sluices over her body. At least the water’s hot. There are proper laundry facilities here. Tomorrow she’ll ask Dulcie if she can handle everyone’s laundry-- they’re already imposing so much. Corona has probably already made another generous financial contribution, but it’s not like they can hire extra help this far out in the country.

When she’s as clean as she’s going to get she throws on pajamas as a sop to modesty and goes to face her fate.

* * *

They’ve spread the spare blanket from the trunk of the car over Dulcie’s bed, and then added Corona, naked and sprawled out on top. Harrow, clothed, nestles against her side, pinioned under Corona’s outflung right leg. There’s room on the other side of the mattress for maybe one more person. Gideon approaches with care.

"We waited for you," says Coronabeth, in tones of reproach. "Why aren’t you naked?"

Gideon remedies that as efficiently as she can. "No Cam tonight?" It’s usually the four of them, together, no matter who’s feeding Harrow. Has been for something like two years now.

"She offered, but she’s got her books and her numbers. It’s just us tonight." Corona grins in the way she does when she’s secured a particularly coveted prize. "Cam will make it up to us."

"Fair enough," says Gideon, sitting tentatively at Cor’s left. "What can I do for you this evening?"

"Just fuck me, Nav." Corona’s arm whips out and hauls her down. Gideon ends up with her cheek mashed onto Corona’s collarbones and one of Corona’s wonderfully thick thighs parting her own. Harrow’s already stroking proprietary fingers down Corona’s sternum, so Gideon splays her hand out on the soft swell of Corona’s belly. It’s not like she’s going to dive straight in with no warm-up. She has _some_ class. 

This close, she can see the thin silvery scars that cover Corona’s pale skin. Corona won’t talk about how she got them. ("Did it hurt?" Gideon had asked once. "There was a total absence of pain," Corona had told her in a brittle voice. Gideon had dropped the subject-- she also has scars she doesn’t want to talk about.) It doesn’t matter, anyway, not when Gideon can trace the spiderweb paths to coax moans out of her.

Harrow lifts the soft mass of Cor’s right tit to reveal the bite scar on the tender underside.

Which reminds Gideon-- there’s one more question she wants to ask before Corona gets too distracted to answer. "Can I touch your breasts?" (Harrow pauses, fangs less than half an inch from Corona’s skin.)

"You will _know_ if I want you to touch my breasts," says Corona, tartly, but it’s not a no. Gideon understands this challenge, freely offered and with the sweetest prize if she wins.

And then Harrow bites in, and Gideon gives up on verbal communication. Instead, she takes her cues from the rhythmic cant of Corona’s hips. Gideon bides her time, reveling in every lickable dimple of fat on Corona’s thighs until Corona snarls and Harrow responds in kind. That’s her cue. If she does this just right-- _god_ , Corona is wet-- if she slides in with two fingers all at once at the angle Corona likes best--

Corona draws her shoulders back and presses her rib cage up. (Harrow makes a small disgruntled noise that Gideon soothes with a hand over the crinkly fabric over the small of her back.) That’s the signal. Corona has given her permission to touch her breasts. Gideon nuzzles into the side of one, and Corona’s inhale breaks halfway through the breath. _Yes_.

Gideon fucks Corona with the confident, steady rhythm that drives her wild. (Let no one ever say that Gideon Nav can’t follow directions.) That’s all muscle memory, though, and it lets Gideon divide her attention between soaking in Corona’s pleasure and touching Corona’s breasts.

They’ve all learned that Corona’s breasts are mercurial, and the touch that works today might not work again for months. Today, she finds what she’s looking for when she sucks Corona’s nipple between her teeth.

Corona moans and bucks, Harrow growls, and Gideon shifts her weight, pinning Corona down to appease them both.

The only way this could be better would be if Cam had been able to join them, Gideon decides, as Corona writhes with abandon under her. Harrow’s cold crepe-covered leg presses up against Gideon’s. Her knee digs painfully into Gideon’s thigh. Gideon presses her leg a little closer, hungry for the contact.

As Corona careens over the edge in a riot of restrained kinetic energy, Harrow withdraws, licking the bite wound until the skin knits back together. Gideon follows suit. She strokes over Harrow’s back and nuzzles at Corona’s shoulder until everyone’s breath is back to normal. They both have half-lidded eyes, dazed with appetite satisfied. Gideon doesn’t even care that she’s slick and aching and dripping all over Corona’s thigh. 

Gideon waits until they fall asleep. It doesn’t take long. Harrow falls asleep fast when she’s fed. In secret, she finishes herself off with a half dozen rough strokes and then joins them.

**Author's Note:**

> I am contractually obligated to inform the populace that my working document for this fic is entitled _vampires I guess_.
> 
> Ten points to everyone who figures out which song I stole both the work title and the chapter titles from. The points aren’t worth anything, and you can’t even redeem them for store credit. Participate at your own risk.


End file.
